Not a single post on the first two pages of r/politics about this. I'm not surprised, considering the overwhelming left-leaning amount of posters on the site; however, **** like this transcends party lines.

EDIT: r/politics mods have deemed the story "off-topic"... sidenote: I've been shadow-banned from both r/democrats and r/republicans. Yay, me!

Judge Geoffrey Crawford, sitting in the U.S. District Court in Rutland, ruled last week that the public access “stations depend on networks maintained by cable operators like Comcast to reach their viewers. Any change in the conditions under which Comcast must carry their programming affects them greatly.”

The ruling means that Vermont Access Network, a consortium of 25 regional organizations running more than 65 public-access stations in the state, can stay involved in a lawsuit between Comcast and the Vermont Public Utility Commission.

The commission, then called the Public Service Board, [ruled 13 months ago] in favor of allowing Comcast a permit to continue operating its cable television systems in the state for the next 11 years. But the permit came with conditions. Regulators said:• Comcast must build 550 miles of line extensions to reach Vermonters who currently don’t have access to cable television.• The company must not only carry public access channels, but within one year it must list the programs being shown on each channel in its digital television guide.• Comcast must provide connections for live programming events, such as selectboard meetings, when the location is within 500 feet of a network connection point.• It must participate in a new regulatory proceeding that will determine whether the company has to carry public access channels in high definition, or HD.

The company objected, first asking the board for reconsideration and, when that failed, Comcast filed suit against the state in federal court.

One complaint by Comcast was that the state was violating its First Amendment rights, interfering in its role as a content provider by imposing line extension and other costs. The state called its requirements “content-neutral.”

Several of the conditions imposed by regulators on Comcast appear to have a direct bearing on the operations of the public access cable stations, and that’s why they asked for the authority to become a party in the case. Intervenor status enables the public access groups to call witnesses, submit evidence and file an appeal if they get and adverse ruling.

Comcast had argued that the Vermont Access Network should be allowed “friend-of-the-court” status, allowing them to offer information to the court, but leaving them with less clout in the case.

“Comcast did not object to Vermont Access Network’s (VAN) participation in the federal appeal as a “friend of the court,” which would have enabled VAN to present its interests as part of the case. Comcast respects the decision of the Court,” company spokeswoman Kristen Roberts said in an email.

Emphasis mine.

We've had great discussion along this vein in the past. Anyone care to weigh in on this?

Rocker...I’m not sure the parallel to other discussionswe had, can you help me understand? Are you seeing a tie between this and Net Neutrality or something?

The ruling seems ridiculous to me, the lawsuit appears to be between Comcast and the state. It seems if either side wants to bring the public access group into the discussion they could call them as a witness. I don’t understand why the public access group has any rights beyond that. If the judge allows them to play an active role in the case why then shouldn’t they do the same exact thing to every channel offered by Comcast? Why doesn’t ESPN get to play a role? Or Fox? Or the Food Network? Etc

Zarniwoop wrote:Rocker...I’m not sure the parallel to other discussionswe had, can you help me understand? Are you seeing a tie between this and Net Neutrality or something?

The ruling seems ridiculous to me, the lawsuit appears to be between Comcast and the state. It seems if either side wants to bring the public access group into the discussion they could call them as a witness. I don’t understand why the public access group has any rights beyond that. If the judge allows them to play an active role in the case why then shouldn’t they do the same exact thing to every channel offered by Comcast? Why doesn’t ESPN get to play a role? Or Fox? Or the Food Network? Etc

I couldn't find the thread where it was discussed on a quick scroll through thread titles, so I threw it in here; but the conversation was centered around using commercial entities to build public infrastructure (probably was in the NN thread).

A few things that stand out to me:

- If ComCast has a contract with the state of Vermont, and it's stipulated that they must carry PAS, then it should comply, renegotiate, or allow competition to move in.

- Claiming that the corporations First Amendment right is being violated seems like a bullshit move.

- Putting the burden of 550 additional miles of extension completely on ComCast or completely on the taxpayer doesn't sit well with me unless agreed upon in the contract negotiation. This goes back to my first sentence about corps and infrastructure; and I'll readily admit that I'm not educated enough about this topic to dive into the nuts and bolts.

I was focusing on the smaller issue of whether the public access groups should be allowed as a major player with full rights into the lawsuit

It seems like the first ammedment thing stems from the state telling not only telling Comcast what channels it has to carry (the public access ones) but also how to carry them - in HD and how they appear on channel guide.

People really, really need to stop trying to equate Seth Rich's death with the DNC/Clinton/Podesta email leaks. It's no more valid than Comet Ping Pong running a secret pedophile dungeon in their non-existent basement or Trump's golden showers in a Russian hotel room.

Pirate Life wrote:People really, really need to stop trying to equate Seth Rich's death with the DNC/Clinton/Podesta email leaks. It's no more valid than Comet Ping Pong running a secret pedophile dungeon in their non-existent basement or Trump's golden showers in a Russian hotel room.

Let the poor kid's family and former girlfriend grieve in peace.

I just don't get this line of thinking... "oh no stop talking about something on the internet, because somebody, somewhere is a family member of the person". Joe Rogan isn't spam emailing his podcast to the family members of Seth Rich, he isn't forcing them to view his content, and I'm pretty sure they're not here on the back pages of a bottom-tier football team message board... I think I'll continue talking about it.

The world is far too interesting and far too strange to just stop talking and wondering about things. We're in an unprecedented era of information transparency and connectivity - to spurn this god-given gift to the people, called "the internet" (which is probably only going to exist in the free and relatively wild-west state that it currently does, for a relatively short period of time), is just.... dumbfounding?

btw Comet did/does have a basement

not that that's the point though, it's an obvious media strawman that helps plebes sleep at night and feel confident that they're smarter and more aware than "the crazies out there"

Let's just say that there appear to be some inconsistencies with the robbery theory in regards to the Seth Rich saga. But, hey... I'm sure that's all just circumstantial and there's nothing to see here. It's merely coincidence that the robber didn't, you know, actually rob him.

The Fed doesn’t create money ... it might release money through lowering interest rates to banks and loaning them more money as well as through selling securities on the open market but it doesn’t create money. The Treasury is the only agency that can create money

And we already have regulations on how private banks can lend money ... mostly done through the Fed

Zarniwoop wrote:The Fed doesn’t create money ... it might release money through lowering interest rates to banks and loaning them more money as well as through selling securities on the open market but it doesn’t create money. The Treasury is the only agency that can create money

And we already have regulations on how private banks can lend money ... mostly done through the Fed

I don't think you're right. Orthodoxy that I've always heard was that money was created when reserve is lent to banks from the fed.

You just identified another area where this happens. When the Fed lends to the treasury.

But wherever there's an account receivable, there is money creation. Its just backed with a good or service rather than debt.

The money supply is fixed and controlled by the Treasury (whether you are talking M1 or M2 it doesn't matter). Only the Treasury can create money. Banks can borrow money from the Fed but then it becomes a liability on their book. So they have a liability to offset the cash asset -- so ultimately money wasn't created. If they lend that money to me to buy a house, I also have a liability against the asset (my house). None of this increases the amount of currency in circulation -- it is still fixed. We have a finite number of bills and coins in existence.

Lending money can help circulate money faster and cause inflation because the demand for money is higher, but it doesn't change the money supply....indeed that's exactly what creates inflation or any increase in price -- higher demand with no change in supply.

-----------

Anyway (maybe we are splitting hairs here), all of this is beside the point of your original post -- which I presume was that we have regulations on how the Fed uses their money but we don't have regulations on how banks can lend. But we do have those. You can say we don't have enough, but we have them. The Fed dictates reserve requirements to banks, thus regulating how much of each dollar the bank has they are allowed to loan. And as you said earlier, the Fed sets the interest rate which they lend money to banks...in a way this works as a regulation too...when the Fed wants to take money out of circulation or reduce the supply the credit they can easily do this by increasing the Fed Funds rate.

And until the last 15 years when we started bailing banks out (thanks Obama, Thanks Bush!) we had natural regulation by the market...when the banks messed up, they paid the penalty...just like the Savings and Loans did 40 years ago. How many of them are still around?

Pirate Life wrote:People really, really need to stop trying to equate Seth Rich's death with the DNC/Clinton/Podesta email leaks. It's no more valid than Comet Ping Pong running a secret pedophile dungeon in their non-existent basement or Trump's golden showers in a Russian hotel room.

Let the poor kid's family and former girlfriend grieve in peace.

I just don't get this line of thinking... "oh no stop talking about something on the internet, because somebody, somewhere is a family member of the person". Joe Rogan isn't spam emailing his podcast to the family members of Seth Rich, he isn't forcing them to view his content, and I'm pretty sure they're not here on the back pages of a bottom-tier football team message board... I think I'll continue talking about it.

The world is far too interesting and far too strange to just stop talking and wondering about things. We're in an unprecedented era of information transparency and connectivity - to spurn this god-given gift to the people, called "the internet" (which is probably only going to exist in the free and relatively wild-west state that it currently does, for a relatively short period of time), is just.... dumbfounding?

btw Comet did/does have a basement

not that that's the point though, it's an obvious media strawman that helps plebes sleep at night and feel confident that they're smarter and more aware than "the crazies out there"

You missed that his quote is talking about harvesting the tomatoes. In addition to the restaurants, they have a farm where they grow produce and pigs to use in the restaurants. The basement is on the farm. No basements on the block where the restaurants are, you'd have to go a few blocks before finding construction in that area with basements due to DC being built on a literal swamp, in some areas basements would just be underground swimming pools at best. That spot on Connecticut Ave being one of those spots, it's also prone to flooding in heavy rain. But hey, what do I know besides living in the area and spending time in DC, the sleuths over at r/TheDonald certainly know better and we should just keep throwing out bits of information that fit our own narratives or for the lulz rather than trying to find the truth. That's always the best solution.

Regardless, I don't see the purpose in discussing stuff like this that's not true and provably not true. Even if you don't care about the family of those involved, it just propagates a narrative that makes it harder to have a discussion on facts. Conspiracy theories like this tend to bleed over into other topics of discussion, become bones of contention and prevent finding common ground to agree upon or solutions to other problems. I guess it doesn't matter that the family of Seth Rich, his friends or his girlfriend at the time of his death have received threats and harassment over their supposed lies, cover ups and having information they aren't telling about Rich's life/death or that a guy went into Comet Ping Pong with a gun to rescue the children. Those are just interesting stories maybe.

You post a lot about how things on Youtube and whatnot have contributed to the degeneracy of our society, how some of the videos are sexualizing children at younger and younger ages and how that's wrong. By your argument above, shouldn't that also just be part of an '...interesting and far too strange world to stop talking and wondering about..."? Aren't these sort of theories along the same lines in the way they tear down the bonds of a civil society?

beardmcdoug wrote:I just don't get this line of thinking... "oh no stop talking about something on the internet, because somebody, somewhere is a family member of the person". Joe Rogan isn't spam emailing his podcast to the family members of Seth Rich, he isn't forcing them to view his content, and I'm pretty sure they're not here on the back pages of a bottom-tier football team message board... I think I'll continue talking about it.

The world is far too interesting and far too strange to just stop talking and wondering about things. We're in an unprecedented era of information transparency and connectivity - to spurn this god-given gift to the people, called "the internet" (which is probably only going to exist in the free and relatively wild-west state that it currently does, for a relatively short period of time), is just.... dumbfounding?

btw Comet did/does have a basement

not that that's the point though, it's an obvious media strawman that helps plebes sleep at night and feel confident that they're smarter and more aware than "the crazies out there"

You missed that his quote is talking about harvesting the tomatoes. In addition to the restaurants, they have a farm where they grow produce and pigs to use in the restaurants. The basement is on the farm. No basements on the block where the restaurants are, you'd have to go a few blocks before finding construction in that area with basements due to DC being built on a literal swamp, in some areas basements would just be underground swimming pools at best. That spot on Connecticut Ave being one of those spots, it's also prone to flooding in heavy rain. But hey, what do I know besides living in the area and spending time in DC, the sleuths over at r/TheDonald certainly know better and we should just keep throwing out bits of information that fit our own narratives or for the lulz rather than trying to find the truth. That's always the best solution.

Regardless, I don't see the purpose in discussing stuff like this that's not true and provably not true. Even if you don't care about the family of those involved, it just propagates a narrative that makes it harder to have a discussion on facts. Conspiracy theories like this tend to bleed over into other topics of discussion, become bones of contention and prevent finding common ground to agree upon or solutions to other problems. I guess it doesn't matter that the family of Seth Rich, his friends or his girlfriend at the time of his death have received threats and harassment over their supposed lies, cover ups and having information they aren't telling about Rich's life/death or that a guy went into Comet Ping Pong with a gun to rescue the children. Those are just interesting stories maybe.

You post a lot about how things on Youtube and whatnot have contributed to the degeneracy of our society, how some of the videos are sexualizing children at younger and younger ages and how that's wrong. By your argument above, shouldn't that also just be part of an '...interesting and far too strange world to stop talking and wondering about..."? Aren't these sort of theories along the same lines in the way they tear down the bonds of a civil society?

thanks for the well thought out response - be back after I squash some early morning projects I've got here

Buc2 wrote:Let's just say that there appear to be some inconsistencies with the robbery theory in regards to the Seth Rich saga. But, hey... I'm sure that's all just circumstantial and there's nothing to see here. It's merely coincidence that the robber didn't, you know, actually rob him.

Not circumstantial or coincidence.

Rich struggled with his attackers, eventually running away from them (he was shot in the back, wasn't execution-style and he was alive and conscious when found). Police were on the scene in less than a minute after the shots were fired. DC has a system called ShotSpotter that listens for gunshots and reports them to police in seconds. Given the timing and that the killer wasn't right on top of Rich when he was shot (no powder burns reported on Rich's clothes or body), stands to reason they fled the scene after firing the shots rather than try to grab anything and risk being caught.

Buc2 wrote:Let's just say that there appear to be some inconsistencies with the robbery theory in regards to the Seth Rich saga. But, hey... I'm sure that's all just circumstantial and there's nothing to see here. It's merely coincidence that the robber didn't, you know, actually rob him.

Not circumstantial or coincidence.

Rich struggled with his attackers, eventually running away from them (he was shot in the back, wasn't execution-style and he was alive and conscious when found). Police were on the scene in less than a minute after the shots were fired. DC has a system called ShotSpotter that listens for gunshots and reports them to police in seconds. Given the timing and that the killer wasn't right on top of Rich when he was shot (no powder burns reported on Rich's clothes or body), stands to reason they fled the scene after firing the shots rather than try to grab anything and risk being caught.

this is fantastic. I had never heard any of this (about this ShotSpotter/police reaction time/powder/shot distance). I am genuinely appreciative of your insight.

I am always willing to admit when I'm wrong when confronted with new information, and here you are presenting some stuff that I had never heard before. This is the exact reason that I bring things up on this forum, because undoubtedly, we all live in slightly different internet bubbles and are exposed to different takes from different sources (and let's be frank, it's impossible to know everything that's out there on the internet). If you have the source handy about the powder burns / timeline breakdown, I'd love it, but otherwise its no biggie - I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Again, thanks for the new (to me) info

Rich struggled with his attackers, eventually running away from them (he was shot in the back, wasn't execution-style and he was alive and conscious when found). Police were on the scene in less than a minute after the shots were fired. DC has a system called ShotSpotter that listens for gunshots and reports them to police in seconds. Given the timing and that the killer wasn't right on top of Rich when he was shot (no powder burns reported on Rich's clothes or body), stands to reason they fled the scene after firing the shots rather than try to grab anything and risk being caught.

this is fantastic. I had never heard any of this (about this ShotSpotter/police reaction time/powder/shot distance). I am genuinely appreciative of your insight.

I am always willing to admit when I'm wrong when confronted with new information, and here you are presenting some stuff that I had never heard before. This is the exact reason that I bring things up on this forum, because undoubtedly, we all live in slightly different internet bubbles and are exposed to different takes from different sources (and let's be frank, it's impossible to know everything that's out there on the internet). If you have the source handy about the powder burns / timeline breakdown, I'd love it, but otherwise its no biggie - I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. Again, thanks for the new (to me) info

again, be back later, re: your other response

Yep. Same here. Sometimes I'll see something and will post it up here just to see what pops because I know my internet bubble is flawed.

beardmcdoug wrote:I just don't get this line of thinking... "oh no stop talking about something on the internet, because somebody, somewhere is a family member of the person". Joe Rogan isn't spam emailing his podcast to the family members of Seth Rich, he isn't forcing them to view his content, and I'm pretty sure they're not here on the back pages of a bottom-tier football team message board... I think I'll continue talking about it.

The world is far too interesting and far too strange to just stop talking and wondering about things. We're in an unprecedented era of information transparency and connectivity - to spurn this god-given gift to the people, called "the internet" (which is probably only going to exist in the free and relatively wild-west state that it currently does, for a relatively short period of time), is just.... dumbfounding?

btw Comet did/does have a basement

not that that's the point though, it's an obvious media strawman that helps plebes sleep at night and feel confident that they're smarter and more aware than "the crazies out there"

You missed that his quote is talking about harvesting the tomatoes. In addition to the restaurants, they have a farm where they grow produce and pigs to use in the restaurants. The basement is on the farm. No basements on the block where the restaurants are, you'd have to go a few blocks before finding construction in that area with basements due to DC being built on a literal swamp, in some areas basements would just be underground swimming pools at best. That spot on Connecticut Ave being one of those spots, it's also prone to flooding in heavy rain. But hey, what do I know besides living in the area and spending time in DC, the sleuths over at r/TheDonald certainly know better and we should just keep throwing out bits of information that fit our own narratives or for the lulz rather than trying to find the truth. That's always the best solution.

Regardless, I don't see the purpose in discussing stuff like this that's not true and provably not true. Even if you don't care about the family of those involved, it just propagates a narrative that makes it harder to have a discussion on facts. Conspiracy theories like this tend to bleed over into other topics of discussion, become bones of contention and prevent finding common ground to agree upon or solutions to other problems. I guess it doesn't matter that the family of Seth Rich, his friends or his girlfriend at the time of his death have received threats and harassment over their supposed lies, cover ups and having information they aren't telling about Rich's life/death or that a guy went into Comet Ping Pong with a gun to rescue the children. Those are just interesting stories maybe.

You post a lot about how things on Youtube and whatnot have contributed to the degeneracy of our society, how some of the videos are sexualizing children at younger and younger ages and how that's wrong. By your argument above, shouldn't that also just be part of an '...interesting and far too strange world to stop talking and wondering about..."? Aren't these sort of theories along the same lines in the way they tear down the bonds of a civil society?

I'll try to knock this out relatively quickly. You're obviously a smart guy, you're well written and have a solid command of the points you're trying to make, so I just want you to know that I am coming from a point of respect for you and truly do appreciate your input so far. to answer your points about alefantis, why talk about this stuff, and how it aligns with my other views about a cohesive society (edit: oh jesus this ended up being long - incoming coffee fueled text wall lol):

- I'll concede your point about basements/architecture in DC. I don't live there and don't have a log of where basements are built in buildings in different parts of the US. I can only take Alefantis at face value when he's getting interviewed about his restaurant and says "we harvest a whole crop of organic tomatoes - 10 tons every year, can them all and store them in the basement", I assume he means he's saying his restaurant has a basement - 6 months later, in an interview, he says he doesn't have a basement. Who cares. It's a complete non-issue, and in my opinion, only distracts from the actual weird, condemnable behavior of the people surrounding the story. And I won't brush it under the rug and completely forget about it, or stop talking about it, and memory-hole it, because to me, there's enough smoke to warrant some attitude of keeping the case "open" in my mind. Brushing **** off and memory-holing it is how people just absolutely stopped giving a **** about things like tower 7 falling despite not being hit by any plane (not to get off on a tangent about that). It's at least worth keeping the book open, is all I'm saying

- One of the main phrases I live by is "don't believe everything you think" and part of having that attitude is being scrutinous about things you're almost certain of, and never "closing the book" on a something you believe at any given time - it's about always going back and re-evaluating what you may have thought about something at some previous time in your life - so it's why I am entirely unwilling to stop considering new information, or to stop having conversations about things that have passed. To me, this is what the internet is for. Real life is different; I would never take anything to the Rich's family and hurt their feelings, but the internet affords the ability to discuss events and people objectively and in sort of "archetypial" ways, without emotions blurring things. I like talking about controversial things on the internet because I think ultimately truth is found in a lot of uncomfortable places - and I believer there's some truth to the concept that, if you get a bunch of relatively informed people together from vastly unique backgrounds, in a anonymous setting (like we are fortunate enough to have here), and allow for all ideas to be considered, however extreme or banal, and throw those ideas into the metaphorical bonfire, that the bullshit will burn away and some relative nuggets of truth will remain, and we each have something to take away. If the conspiracies have no truth, then they should (and generally do, IMO) burn away. But there is nothing wrong with at least throwing them into the fire

- I understand what you're saying about the crazies who end up acting on it, who go to Comet with a shotgun - that **** is absolutely nuts - but I'm also a pretty firm believer in the idea that you can only control your actions - and that I've seen enough odd, and sometimes maddening, behavior from the human race to understand that trying to go around controlling the way people behave is a complete waste of time - so I take absolutely zero responsibility for the behavior of somebody else's actions that are so beyond outside anything I would personally do. To each their own, and I only pray people don't do anything outwardly hurtful to people on the basis of half-baked information.

- your last point about the "cohesiveness of society" thing, is indeed, one of the things I'm most interested in in life. I want to see all people succeed based on the merit of their actions and live fulfilling, purposeful lives - but part of creating a society where that is most possible, in my opinion, is first founded on taking a realistic look at the nature of the society that we currently have, judging harshly what is good and what is bad, and cutting out the cancer when we identify it. We live in an incredibly fucked up world, and I've seen enough about historical politics, and understand the nature of man well enough to realize that much of what we see around us today is by design. Not all of it - some of it naturally manifests, but it is my opinion, based on the information that I have gathered in my life so far, that much of what plagues society, and impedes our progress towards that idealized vision of a philosphically-advanced and cohesive society comes from subversive actions of those that stand to gain from maintaining the chaotic status quo. You, as well as I, know that history isn't exactly what they teach in text books, and that some of what we at any given time in history thought "probably wasn't true", turned out to be true, or had shades of truth (thanks to declassification of intelligence documents, wikileaks, etc). So it is my opinion that it is quite worth investigating where I see smoke, and to talk about it, and to share information, to teach others, to see things in larger scales, to gain deeper understanding, so that we can pinpoint the roots focus our disdain towards the people or the ideas that are truly inhibiting our societal/philosophical progression, remove them from influence, and by doing so, hopefully one day arrive at that idealized vision of a cohesive society that I think all of us imagine